This invention relates to interactive television program guides, and more particularly, to television program guides that support a video window function which may be used when browsing for available television programs. A television program, a program guide display and a program guide video window may be displayed on the display screen at the same time.
For a number of years certain television receivers have been equipped with a picture-in-picture (PIP) capability. In PIP mode, images of one television channel are displayed in the background while a PIP video window containing images of another channel is overlaid on a small area of the background. This feature allows viewers to simultaneously view video of programs being broadcast on two different channels. Television receivers with this capability typically contain two dedicated video tuners, one for the PIP window and one for the background screen. Viewers may enter and exit PIP mode by using specified keys on a remote control unit.
Television program guides help television viewers to select programs of interest. Viewers have traditionally consulted printed television program schedules to determine programs being broadcast at a particular time. Recently, cable, satellite, and broadcast television systems have provided viewers with an increasingly large number of television channels to choose from. As the number of potential programs of interest to the viewer has increased, interactive electronic program guides have been developed to help viewers determine which programs may be of particular interest. Such interactive program guides may be implemented using a microprocessor-controlled set-top box that is coupled to the viewer""s television set. The set-top boxes receive program information from a central broadcasting center. Program information is stored in a memory within the set-top box. This information typically includes program titles, broadcast times, channels, program descriptions, etc.
Viewers can enter the xe2x80x9cbrowse modexe2x80x9d of a program guide and use remote control cursor keys to scan through a list of available programming while still watching television. Once a program of interest has been located, the viewer can use a remote control to command the set-top box to tune to the displayed program listing.
Interactive programs guides may be arranged in a variety of formats. Some program guides display programming information as an overlay on top of a television channel. This type of arrangement does not allow viewers to browse video of other channels while continuing to view the video of a program in progress. Moreover, if the viewer is interested in video of a certain program listed on the program guide, he or she must first exit the program guide and then tune to that channel by pressing a select key.
Other program guides display a grid of current program listings on the viewer""s display screen as an overlay on top of a television channel. As described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/054,917, filed Apr. 2, 1998, the viewer may scroll a highlight region through the program listings while monitoring the program to which the system is tuned in a quarter-screen window. A text description of the highlighted program is also provided. This type of program guide covers the entire television screen and does not allow the viewer to watch video of two channels concurrently.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a program guide system with improved browsing capabilities.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a program guide system that interacts with a video window so that a viewer may simultaneously view video from two different television channels.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a program guide system that allows a viewer to view both information about and video of a program to be shown at a future time.
It is further object of the present invention to provide a program guide system which allows a viewer to swap television programs back and forth between a program shown in a program guide video window and a program shown on a main video screen without having to exit the program guide.
It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a program guide system which allows a viewer to the switch audio signal broadcast by a television back and forth between a program shown on a program guide video window and a program shown on a background screen without having to exit the program guide.
These and other objects of the invention are accomplished in accordance with the principles of the present invention by providing an interactive television program guide system with a video window capability. The viewer may direct the program guide to display a program guide video window that contains video for a program currently being broadcast on another channel or a video clip of a program to be shown sometime in the future.
The program guide display of the present invention contains information for programs that are shown on particular channels during certain time intervals. Information about programs being shown at other times or on other channels is not displayed. The viewer may obtain information about available programming by browsing through channels on the program guide using cursor keys and/or numeric keys.
The viewer may direct the program guide to display a program guide video window on the viewer""s television screen. The program guide video window may be activated and deactivated using any suitable means such as pressing a key on a remote control unit. The program guide video window may be used to browse video of programs currently shown on other channels, to browse video clips of future programs, or to browse programming that is available xe2x80x9con demandxe2x80x9d (VOD programs). When the program guide display and the video window are active, the program guide may re-proportion the amount of screen area used by the current channel such that the program guide display, the video window, and current channel are displayed unobscured. However, if desired, the program guide display and the program guide video window may be superimposed on a portion of the viewer""s television screen, blocking certain portions of the current channel. Both of these screen formats are arranged such that the viewer may continue to watch the current channel while the program guide and the program guide video window are displayed. Thus, the viewer may continue to watch one program while browsing video of other programs. As the viewer browses through other available programming, the contents of the program guide video window may be updated to match the program currently shown on the program guide.
The program guide display may also include brief text descriptions of the displayed programs. When the viewer browses through available programming with remote control keys, the brief descriptions may be automatically updated to correspond to the displayed programs.
The program guide may provide a swap feature which can be used to exchange a program shown in the program guide video window with a program shown on the main display screen. The viewer may direct the program guide to swap these programs using any suitable means such as pressing a swap key on a remote control unit. The xe2x80x9cprogram swapxe2x80x9d may be reversed by once again pressing (toggling) the swap key. One benefit of this feature is that it allows a viewer to directly tune the main display screen to a program of potential interest without having to exit the browse mode.
The program guide may also provide an audio select feature that can be used when both the program guide video window and the program guide display are active. The audio select feature enables the viewer to choose which audio signal is to be broadcast by the television, the audio signal from a program shown on the main display screen or the audio signal from a program shown in the program guide video window. The viewer may switch back and forth between these two audio signals by pressing an audio select key on a remote control unit. This allows a viewer to browse both the audio and video of a potential program of interest without having to exit the program guide.